Gearing Up For I/O But Where’s Vic?

At Google IO last year one of the most enthusiastic people about Android was Vic Gundotra. Vic Gundotra, is a champion of all things Google and one of those Googler’s that stays face front in the community as an evangelist for many Google products, especially Android.

The week Larry Page re-took over as CEO for the company he co-founded he made a bunch of management changes. His goal was to cut down on the middle men (and women) and have one person in charge and responsible to Page for each of Google’s products and businesses. This person would be the Senior Vice President of XX reporting directly to Page.

It was pointed out in Google’s Q1 earnings call that the way Page saw the old structure was he could have the heads of just three products or businesses within Google in for a meeting and it would amount to 12-15 people. With this new approach there will be just one such person for every business. The great thing about Page’s new approach as in true Google fashion Page made these promotions of engineers and not managers.

Andy Rubin, creator of Android (and the T-Mobile Sidekick) was appointed the new Senior Vice President of Mobile. In this position he oversees not just Android but all of Google’s mobile businesses.

We also found at that Vic Gundotra was appointed Senior Vice President of Social. Social? Yes, social! Just prior to Page’s taking over for Eric Schmidt he started soliciting the feedback of some of Google’s top guys. Regardless of what he had been working on at the time, Gundotra made up a presentation for Page that said if Google doesn’t do something about Social soon they would get killed by Facebook.

This bold and challenging statement (which according to Steve Levy’s recent book, Larry Page thrives on) caught Pages ear. Not only is Gundotra the Senior Vice President of Social, but Page also sent out to all Googler’s saying if they didn’t get this social thing figured out in 2011 he would potentially lower company bonuses by 25%.

Google has until about the time that Facebook figures out how to put an internet search bar in the facebook window, before it will be too late for them to get into the social game.

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